12Jan16

Iran Seizes U.S. Sailors Amid Claims of Spying

Two United States Navy patrol boats and their crews were seized by the
Iranian authorities in the Persian Gulf on Tuesday during what a Tehran news
agency alleged was "snooping."

But the Pentagon and the State Department said that one of the boats had
experienced mechanical problems while en route from Kuwait to Bahrain on a
routine mission. Administration officials said that the military had lost contact
with the boats before they strayed into Iranian territorial waters. They said
they had received assurances from Iran that the 10 sailors would be returned
soon, perhaps on Wednesday.

The semiofficial Fars news agency in Iran said that the boats had illegally
traveled more than a mile into Iranian waters near Farsi Island, the site of a
major Iranian naval base. It said that members of the Islamic Revolutionary
Guards Navy had confiscated GPS equipment, which would "prove that the
American ships were 'snooping' around in Iranian waters."

The waters where the boats were sailing are a frequent location for
intelligence collection by the United States, Iran and many gulf countries. The
American and Iranian navies encounter each other frequently there.

The detention of the sailors comes at a particularly delicate moment in the
tense American-Iranian relationship, just days before the formal
implementation of a nuclear deal in which the United States is supposed to
unfreeze about $100 billion in Iranian assets.

That step is to be made after international nuclear inspectors verify that Iran
has shipped 98 percent of its nuclear fuel out of the country and disabled and
removed centrifuges, and taken a large plutonium reactor permanently offline.

The American sailors were aboard two riverine patrol boats — 38-foot,
high-speed boats that are used to patrol rivers and littoral waters. One official
said the two vessels, which often patrol shallow waters near Bahrain, had
failed to make a scheduled rendezvous with a larger ship to refuel.

Secretary of State John Kerry, an official said, was notified of the seizing of
the sailors while meeting with top Philippines officials and Defense Secretary
Ashton B. Carter. Mr. Kerry broke off the meeting and called his Iranian
counterpart, Mohammad Javad Zarif, with whom he spent months negotiating
the nuclear accord. As he walked into the House chamber Tuesday night for
President Obama's State of the Union address, Mr. Kerry said the sailors were
"going to get out."

It is unclear what power Mr. Zarif may have to intervene. Many American and
Middle Eastern officials believe that recent actions by the Iranian Navy against
American forces in the Gulf may be intended to embarrass Mr. Zarif and
President Hassan Rouhani. The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps was
responsible for the military side of the nuclear program, and many of its
senior officers have objected to the nuclear agreement.

American and European officials say that the nuclear accord should go into
effect sometime next week. That is called "implementation day," and it is
crucial to Mr. Rouhani, who wants to demonstrate to voters that he has
succeeded in getting oil and financial sanctions lifted, and Iranian funds
unfrozen, ahead of a critical parliamentary election.

Many Republicans in Congress have vowed to prevent that day from coming.
Mr. Obama issued a veto threat on Monday against a House bill that would
delay implementation day until the president can certify that Iran has reported
all of its past work toward designing a nuclear weapon. International
inspectors recently declared that Iran had a program "consistent" with
weapons work through 2009, but that it then ceased. Iran has always denied
it ever sought a weapon.

Mr. Obama and Mr. Rouhani share the same problem: Their political
opponents want to kill the deal. Both men are determined to see it through.
The Treasury Department is expected to place some new sanctions on Iran for
recent missile tests — which are not covered by the nuclear pact — but that
effort has been delayed for reasons American officials will not discuss. A draft
of the sanctions declaration was circulated on Capitol Hill just before the new
year and quickly leaked.

In the skies and waters of the Persian Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz, the Arabian
Sea and the Gulf of Aden, Iran and the United States constantly watch each
other. American naval ships roam the waters along Iran's 1,100-mile southern
coastline, their radar trained on the shore and on Iranian ships leaving their
harbors. Iranian fighter jets patrol the skies, keeping an eye on American
combat planes that take off from an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf every
time an Iranian jet comes close to their ship.

The Navy's Fifth Fleet maintains a presence in the Persian Gulf, including the
aircraft carrier, and lately has had several episodes with Iran.

Two weeks ago, the Iranian Navy harassed an American carrier and a French
frigate in the Strait of Hormuz, launching rockets that passed within 1,500
yards of the aircraft carrier Harry S. Truman.

Last year in the Gulf of Aden, an Iranian Navy frigate approached a ship
where an American military helicopter had just landed and pointed a heavy
machine gun at the copter for several minutes before turning around, all while
an Iranian film crew videotaped the encounter. The Fifth Fleet, for its part,
has its own videotape of the episode.

In 2007, the Revolutionary Guards Navy captured 15 British military service
members and held them for 13 days, making a point of protecting its sea
borders. A year later, the British Navy released a report saying that its vessels
had been in an area with disputed borders between Iran and Iraq.

[Source: By Helene Cooper and David E. Sanger, The New York Times,
Washington, 12Jan16]

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